Kelly Duda

Kelly Duda is an American filmmaker and activist from Arkansas. Duda spent seven years making Factor 8: The Arkansas Prison Blood Scandal.

Variety magazine described Duda as "a pit bull with a bureaucratic bone" who "follows subjects fearlessly and ventures into hostile environs (and) comes away, most of the time, with the information he wants to get." Variety described Factor 8 as "hard-headed journalism" stating, "one of the things that hits the viewer in 'Factor 8' is that Ken Starr spent more than $40 million trying to pin something on then-President Bill Clinton, and missed what Duda found via sheer leg work." Duda experienced a significant amount of blow back in his native state of Arkansas as a result of his investigation, including claims of death threats, his tires being slashed, break-ins, files being stolen, and other things.Variety also reported on a lawsuit filed against Kelly Duda by Micheal Galster for the theft of intellectual property. After winning an injunction against Duda in January 2004, both parties reached a verbal agreement in April 2005 resulting in the lifting of the injunction.

The American Film Institute remarked, "Kelly Duda's dedication to the truth is an inspiration—this exposé wears his heart on its sleeve, refusing to let the victims die in vain."

Duda was also part of the team for Fuji Television that produced The Hepatitis C Epidemic: A 15-Year Government Cover-up. The program won a George Foster Peabody Award in 2003 and was reportedly watched by more than 12 million viewers in Japan.

Evidence and documents unearthed by Duda were used to help 5,500 "forgotten" Canadian victims of tainted blood receive a $1 billion compensation package from the Canadian federal government in 2006.

On July 11, 2007, Duda testified (as the only American) at the Lord Archer Inquiry on Contaminated Blood in the Parliament of the United Kingdom overseen by Peter Archer, Baron Archer of Sandwell. The British inquiry aimed to uncover the British government's part in a scandal that led to thousands of infections and deaths. Duda gave evidence as to the United States' role in the tragedy in what Lord Robert Winston has dubbed as "the worst treatment disaster in the history of the National Health Service". Describing him as "a bit of a maverick", the New Statesman remarked about Duda that, "his flat American accent stood out at the inquiry but not as much as his character," adding, "By the time he was done testifying to Lord Archer of Sandwell’s Inquiry, those in the audience who weren't familiar with his work had been swayed that the scandal was even worse than they realized - an idea that seemed impossible only one hour earlier."

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